WASHINGTON – Their relationship seemed doomed from the start. It was mostly a long-distance affair conducted in public exchanges, tempered by occasional awkward gestures of warmth but more often singed by open hostility. It most likely ended, mercifully, Thursday over white turkey chili and Southwestern grilled chicken salad.

President Barack Obama and the vanquished Mitt Romney ate lunch in a private dining room steps from the Oval Office, the seat of power they battled over for months, some might say years.

The meeting, a decades-old tradition between former rivals, put a bow on an otherwise ugly race marked by very few attempts to pretend the candidates liked each other. Until Thursday, that is, when a smiling Romney stopped by the White House. He left a little more than an hour later.